tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15549266Thu, 08 Dec 2016 09:29:26 +0000Housing PolicyLow Energy HomesRenewablesTimber Frame/MMCBusiness StoriesInsulationVentilationWindows and doorsEco Bollocks AwardsBuilding plotCO2 emissionsColindaleDIY electricsGreen electricityLondon Fire BrigadePart PTimber frame firesUptonUrban designclaim VATeast of england planhome electricshousing developmenthousing projectionsselfbuildHousebuilder's UpdateNews, analysis and opinion on housebuilding by Ovolo Books' authors including Mark Brinkley, Tim Pullen, Roy Speer and othershttp://www.housebuildersupdate.co.uk/noreply@blogger.com (Ovolo Books)Blogger218125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15549266.post-8118933010502014908Tue, 22 Jun 2010 10:45:00 +00002010-06-22T11:45:48.919+01:00Building plotGardon plot availability<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_vAPDm0kcrCQ/TCCSiEJJHQI/AAAAAAAAACk/n8DcFAXKrqk/s1600/7.5.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_vAPDm0kcrCQ/TCCSiEJJHQI/AAAAAAAAACk/n8DcFAXKrqk/s320/7.5.JPG" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;">&nbsp;<span style="font-size: xx-small;"><i><b>The demise of garden plots may not be upon us</b></i></span></div><br /><span style="font-family: &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">On 9th June amid much fanfare the government announced it was ending ‘garden grabbing’. The media eagerly interpreted this as meaning there would be no more building in gardens. But, what does the change in policy really mean and does it signal the end of self-build as we know it? Maybe not.</span><br style="font-family: &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;" /><span style="font-family: &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">&nbsp;</span><br style="font-family: &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;" /><span style="font-family: &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The relevant change made to the house-building guidance is to take private residential gardens, parks, recreation grounds and allotments out of the definition of previously developed land or ‘brownfield’, on which at least 60% of all new house-building is expected to take place. What difference will this make? Well, government guidance said (and still says) that there was no presumption all previously-developed land was suitable for housing development or that the whole of the site could be built on anyway. The ‘brownfield’ classification didn’t over ride other polices, such as countryside protection or preserving the privacy of existing houses. In response to ‘garden grabbing’ accusations, the last government pointed out in January this year that councils already had powers to prevent inappropriate building in gardens.</span><br /><blockquote style="font-family: &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><i><span style="font-size: large;">'Councils now have the power to protect gardens from inappropriate development - but the new guidance doesn’t say anywhere that gardens can't be built on'</span></i></blockquote><div style="font-family: &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The statements which accompanied the new guidance said only that councils would have the power to protect gardens from inappropriate development - the new guidance doesn’t say anywhere that gardens cannot be built on. The thrust of several proposed planning reforms is to give power to councils to set their own rules so we shall have to see what approach each council chooses to adopt for its area as new policy documents are drawn up. Most councils have existing policies which permit houses to be built on suitable sites inside the built-up areas of towns and villages. That’s likely to continue because the alternatives are for acute housing shortages leading to astronomic house prices with people sleeping ten to a room or building on 'greenfield' sites outside towns, which was even less popular with the public than building in gardens. A research report by Kingston University last year found that building on back gardens was not a widespread, national or growing problem.<br /><br />This change in policy has the ring of a new government giving its supporters a headline to cheer about and, no doubt, some councils will use the new guidance as an excuse to turn down some locally unpopular garden planning applications. No one yet knows where this will end – least of all government ministers – and we shall have to see how councils react. Houses were being built in gardens long before the current or previous versions of this guidance existed. The chances are that garden building will continue for many years yet. Rumours of the death of garden self-builds may yet prove to have been greatly exaggerated.</div><div style="font-family: &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span></div><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Roy Speer, Planning Consultant and co-author of </span><a href="http://www.ovolobooks.co.uk/books_planningpermission.php" style="font-family: &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><i>How to Get Planning Permission</i></a><span style="font-family: &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> and </span><i style="font-family: &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Find-Building-Plot-Step-step/dp/190595932X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&amp;s=books&amp;qid=1277202798&amp;sr=8-1">How to Find and Buy a Building Plot</a></i></span><div class="blogger-post-footer">Visit http://www.ovolobooks.co.uk for more information on our leading self-build books</div>http://www.housebuildersupdate.co.uk/2010/06/gardon-plot-availability.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Ovolo Books)32tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15549266.post-2629905785102278434Mon, 14 Jun 2010 16:14:00 +00002010-06-14T17:14:24.662+01:00How to find and buy a building plot<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_vAPDm0kcrCQ/TBZVVktVd1I/AAAAAAAAACc/e-VqxKZgNtA/s1600/plot+front+cover+v2.1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_vAPDm0kcrCQ/TBZVVktVd1I/AAAAAAAAACc/e-VqxKZgNtA/s320/plot+front+cover+v2.1.jpg" /></a></div>A new edition of the best-selling book on finding plots has been published by Ovolo Books. Priced at £15.95 the new edition is bang up to date and contains great advice on finding consented land or land on which to obtain consent<div class="blogger-post-footer">Visit http://www.ovolobooks.co.uk for more information on our leading self-build books</div>http://www.housebuildersupdate.co.uk/2010/06/how-to-find-and-buy-building-plot.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Ovolo Books)23tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15549266.post-8543767201069651559Thu, 17 Apr 2008 15:19:00 +00002008-04-17T16:20:09.292+01:00OFT Investigation into Bid RiggingPeople may be shocked that <a href="http://www.building.co.uk/story.asp?storycode=3111363&origin=bldgdailynews">112 firms have been accused of bid rigging</a>, but my guess is that the practice is so widespread, that it’s almost universal. It’s certainly just as common down at the smaller end of the building game as it appears to be up amongst the big boys, and I can remember it going on on a casual basis all over the place when I was involved in the jobbing building market.<br /><br />Here’s what the current edition of the Housebuilder’s Bible currently has to say on the topic:<br /><br />One practice which is now becoming prevalent is for busy builders to get together and divide up the work in a way (and for a price) that suits them – it’s called covering. It works like this. A job is put out to tender – typically by an architect – to four or five local builders. Some of them are so busy that they simply don’t want to take on any more work. Architects tend to regard refusals to quote rather badly and the builders feel that, rather than risking losing the possibility of quoting for future work, they would like to put in some price, any price. So the next step is to chat with the competition – it’s not hard, it happens naturally anyway – and soon an informal cartel is in place.<br /><br />Reg: ‘Have you been asked to quote for the old Rectory Job at Chipping Butty?’ <br />Charlie: ‘Yes. I like the look of it.’ <br />Reg: ‘I really can’t see any way we could do that one – could you do us a favour and cover us.’ <br />Charlie: ‘Sure – I’ve no doubt you’ll be able to return the favour soon.’ <br /><br />So Charlie puts in his price and tells Reg to put in a price maybe £20,000 higher. Reg knows he won’t get the job but he hasn’t spent any time or money quoting for it and he hasn’t upset the architect so he’ll stand a chance next time around when he does want the work. <br /><br />Occasionally the builders know all the other tenderers on any given job – in matters like this the grapevine works extremely efficiently – so that there are cases where every builder on the tendering list has been in on the scam. They all know who is providing the lowest quote and, consequently, the lowest quote is in reality quite a high one. Such a complete stitch-up is perhaps rare but frequently two or three of the quotes will be for show purposes only. <br /><br />Partly this problem stems from the way building work is procured in the first place. And in particular the practice of builders quoting for free causes a lot of problems. It sounds too good to be true and of course it is. It takes a good deal of time to generate an accurate quotation and most builders simply send tender documents off to a quantity surveyor who carries out the work for them (for a scaled fee, depending on the size of the job). Now builders often end up quoting for five or six jobs in order to win one so the overheads of quoting for jobs they don’t get becomes a significant business expense in itself. Anything that helps to ease the load of having to quote for jobs is manna from heaven for builders so you can see the attraction of any informal price fixing arrangements they might concoct.<div class="blogger-post-footer">Visit http://www.ovolobooks.co.uk for more information on our leading self-build books</div>http://www.housebuildersupdate.co.uk/2008/04/oft-investigation-into-bid-rigging.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Mark Brinkley)28tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15549266.post-7360573027741664547Sun, 09 Mar 2008 18:37:00 +00002008-03-09T19:37:44.132+01:00Planning Alerts.comWant to know what’s cooking, planning-wise, in your street? Visit <a href="http://www.planningalerts.com"> Planning Alerts.com</a>, key in your email address and the postcode you are interested in and you will receive email notification of any new applications in your neighbourhood. It’s in beta and not all local councils are yet included but it’s a good idea, and its free. Alerted to this by <a href="http://geoffjones.com">Geoff Jones</a>.<div class="blogger-post-footer">Visit http://www.ovolobooks.co.uk for more information on our leading self-build books</div>http://www.housebuildersupdate.co.uk/2008/03/planning-alertscom.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Mark Brinkley)11tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15549266.post-1772760806606717290Thu, 21 Feb 2008 07:02:00 +00002008-12-11T14:10:37.516+01:00GD Fever<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_3iqp6erxj3s/R70gaOcQy8I/AAAAAAAAAP4/W080MvfG_CY/s1600-h/baufritz+pub+event.JPG"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_3iqp6erxj3s/R70gaOcQy8I/AAAAAAAAAP4/W080MvfG_CY/s320/baufritz+pub+event.JPG" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5169323582216522690" /></a>What are these people watching? It’s a Wednesday night in Cambridge, there is European football on ITV and Sky, but no, they are not watching the footie. The Brit Awards are also on featuring Sharon Osbourne swearing at Vic Reeves, but they aren’t watching that either.<br /><br />They are all gathered here to watch <a href="http://www.channel4.com/4homes/ontv/grand-designs/houses/B/Grand-Designs-Bath.html">Grand Designs</a>. Could this be the start of a new trend? The subject of the programme was an extraordinary house being built on a steep hillside in Bath and this particular group was brought together by <a href="http://www.baufritz.co.uk">Baufritz</a> who supplied the above ground parts of the structure in the programme. Being a super efficient German housebuilding operation, they were pretty confident that Kevin McCloud was going to be complimentary and they invited a group of friends, prospective clients and staff along for beer and nibbles. <br /><br />So were they over the moon? Or sick as a parrot? “Too much of the programme was spent on the groundworks” was a frequently heard observation, along with “Tiffany was magnificent” and “I never knew a staircase could be a thing of such beauty.” And no doubt about this result: England 0 Germany 2.<div class="blogger-post-footer">Visit http://www.ovolobooks.co.uk for more information on our leading self-build books</div>http://www.housebuildersupdate.co.uk/2008/02/gd-fever.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Mark Brinkley)33tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15549266.post-1237667227579591244Wed, 20 Feb 2008 11:13:00 +00002008-02-20T12:14:10.570+01:00FIRST PASSIVHAUS IN UK?I have been lead to believe, and I think Mr Brinkley will confirm, that there are no house in the UK built to the German Passivhaus standard. I think Mr Brinkley was considering building one but I don’t know if he has done it. In any event, I have just come across what I believe to be the first. <br /><br />It is actually 2 flats, a 1-bedroom and 2-bedroom, built in the inner city of Cardiff, by an Italian lady. The lady is in fact an architect, educated in Munich, so it is perhaps less surprising that she adopted the Passivhaus standard. <br /><br />The property is a very contemporary looking house, built in the quiet cul-de-sacs of the Roath area of Cardiff. It has a slightly surreal feel being surrounded as it is by Victorian terraces. The 2 properties next door are also modern-looking but in a more traditional way, which helps to soften the impact of the house. <br /><br />For those that don’t know the Passivhaus standard was established by the Passivhaus Istitut in Darmstadt, Germany is 1996. Since then around 6,000 houses have been built and certified to the standard, across Europe and the USA. What Passivhaus means, in broad terms, is that the building is insulated to a level that allows the sun and other passive heat gains to produce enough energy to heat the home. Passive gain is the heat from daily activity, given off by people, cooking, the shower, making toast, boiling the kettle. Pretty much everything we do produces heat which can be captured and circulated from warmer rooms (bathroom and kitchen) to cooler rooms (lounge and bedroom) by a heat recovery and ventilation system. Passive solar heat always plays a big role in this design of house and, as is typical, this house has a south-facing wall that is entirely glazed. These are triple-glazed sliding doors that give good access to the garden in summer but allow heat to be captured in winter. They have a U-value of less than 1 compared to 1.8 for the best double-glazed windows. <br /><br />On the day I visited, the outside air temperature was 50C. The temperature inside was a very comfy 190C. This is a little lower than the typical central heated house, indeed my office is at this moment 210C, but feels cooler than the Cardiff house. This is attributed to the walls of the Cardiff house being lined in plywood. The lady who built it said “wood gives off less coolth than stone”. And I believe her. Mine is a stone cottage and the walls are cool to the touch. Her walls felt warm. <br /><br />This house has a has a number of remarkable features. <br /><br />1. It has no heating. No boiler, no fireplace, no stove, no fan heater, nothing. And it is warm. <br />2. It is a timber-frame house built entirely by local labour. It is not a pre-fab manufactured by hyper-efficient German engineers. She used ordinary Welsh builders with no special skills and no special knowledge. In fact these guys were learning on the job, which did lead to a bit of budget and schedule over-run. <br />3. The house came in at around £1,200 per m². Which may be a bit high for the standard of finish achieved, but is within bounds and would show a profit if she sold it. <br />4. The house has lots of solar energy on the roof, both thermal which generates around 70% of her hot water, and PV which generates about 50% of her electrical demand (and these are included in the £1,200 per m²)<br />5. The whole house, every last detail, is recyclable. Further, most of it is reusable, i.e. it has been built in such a way as to be immediately removable, without damage, to be re-used in another house. <br />6. She has installed rainwater harvesting to reduce her water consumption from the mains to less than half the normal. <br /><br /><br />A house that needs no heating needs a lot of insulation. This house has 380mm in the walls, 200mm under the floor and 430mm in the roof. This insulation is all hemp, which has low embodied energy and ever sequesters CO2. This compares to the normal UK standard of 90mm in the walls, 75mm under the floor and 270mm in the roof. In also needs a very high level of air-tightness to prevent heat losses from air movement, and that is where the contractors encountered most of their problems. They were just not used to building to these levels of precision and had to re-do a fair bit of the work. <br /><br />The point of all this is that it can be done. What this lady has proved is that a self-builder can build a highly efficient house, with trivial running costs (she estimates her annual energy bill at less than £200) without recourse to specialist materials or suppliers. Under the Code for Sustainable Homes the house would easily reach level 4 and maybe level 5. <br /><br />What she has shown is that all the bleating from the house building industry that zero carbon is unachievable is nonsense. If the process that this lady has pioneered were taken up by the big companies it could be lifted to level 6 and zero carbon emissions without too much trouble. And bring in affordable, sustainable and profitable houses. Is it not time that the house building industry stopped whinging and got on with building the houses we need?<div class="blogger-post-footer">Visit http://www.ovolobooks.co.uk for more information on our leading self-build books</div>http://www.housebuildersupdate.co.uk/2008/02/first-passivhaus-in-uk.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Tim Pullen)18tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15549266.post-2413780134708434066Wed, 20 Feb 2008 10:08:00 +00002008-02-20T11:13:36.298+01:00Climbing on a Sustainable BandwagonI have just had the rare privilege of attending an RIBA accredited seminar on “Innovation in Natural Ventilation”. For a sustainable building guy like me that is hot stuff. In these days of passive houses, ultra high insulation and ultra low air movement, Innovation in Natural Ventilation is just what I need. <br /><br />So I duly pitch-up to the local college, full of anticipation for a couple of hours deeply immersed in thermal stacks, heat plumes, low pressure zones, thermal atria and natural convection. What did we get – a bloke selling windows. <br /><br />A very nice bloke, who knows a lot about windows, but then there is only so much you can know about windows. He did tell us about a new window – parallel opening rather than top, bottom or side hung. Which was interesting for about 15 seconds but struggled to fill a 2 hours seminar. <br /><br />The bloke’s sole claim for the sustainability of his windows was that opening a window means putting less cooling into the property. Which even he agreed was a bit thin in terms of sustainability credentials. These are, after all, glass panes in an aluminium and stainless steel frame. None or which are particularly sustainable. <br /><br />By the end of the seminar the issue that was really making me cross was the title of the seminar. It had only one word of truth in it. There was no innovation (parallel opening windows might be an interesting spin but we have had sliding sashes for quite some time) and nothing natural. True, windows provide ventilation but that hardly warrants a 2 hour RIBA accredited seminar. <br /><br />This was, in truth, another example of the double glazing industry finding a new way of selling an old product. <br /><br />My view is that sustainability is a serious issue. Maybe I am bound to say that, but why wouldn’t I? I make a living from untangling the conflicting and often misleading information provided by companies purporting to offer a sustainable product. The Windsave wind turbine is a case in point. At £1,200 for your own micro-generation plant it looked like a good idea. The fact that it fundamentally does not work in the way the manufacturer’s suggest caused all sorts of people all sorts of problems, but didn’t seem to worry the manufacturers too much. Or the DTI who spent so much in grants for this one machine that it brought the whole grant scheme for all renewable energy technology crashing down. <br /><br />Sustainability is said to be “meeting the needs of the current generation without impacting on the ability of future generations to meet their own needs”. If the domestic housing industry is going to change to meet this challenge it has to be on the back of good information, with products that are truly innovative and that really are sustainable. <br /><br />Maybe it is time for labelling! The BRE produce a guide to sustainable specification and RIBA have accredited this course. Maybe it is time for a star rating system for sustainable products so that the consumer (and the professional specifier) know what the real credentials of any product are. My guess is that the windows I saw today would struggle to get a single star, while wooden sliding sashes would be up at a 4 star rating.<div class="blogger-post-footer">Visit http://www.ovolobooks.co.uk for more information on our leading self-build books</div>http://www.housebuildersupdate.co.uk/2008/02/climbing-on-sustainable-bandwagon.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Tim Pullen)11tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15549266.post-7248388670346047559Thu, 07 Feb 2008 08:18:00 +00002008-12-11T14:10:37.749+01:00Are these no heat homes?<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_3iqp6erxj3s/R5cSBDu5GsI/AAAAAAAAAOc/BpLJa14NO_U/s1600-h/SIPS.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_3iqp6erxj3s/R5cSBDu5GsI/AAAAAAAAAOc/BpLJa14NO_U/s320/SIPS.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5158611707567348418" /></a>“We are building homes with no heating systems already.” That was the bold claim made to me by Andy Porter of <a href="http://www.claysllp.co.uk">SIPS@CLAYS </a>at the Harrogate <a href="http://www.homebuildingshow.co.uk"> Homebuilding & Renovating show</a> back in November. <br /><br />“Well, if you are, I’d like to see one,” I replied.<br /><br />And so it came to pass that on Wednesday of last week, I met up with Andy and he took me to see two of their newly completed homes, one near Beverley in Yorkshire and the other in Accrington, Lancs, both of them what I would call classic selfbuilds.<br /><br />Both homes had been constructed with <a href="http://www.tek.kingspan.com/">Kingspan Tek SIPS panels</a>, 142mm thick, with a U value of 0.2. This is hardly surprising as this is the construction system that SIPS@CLAYS specialise in — they were one of the original Kingspan Tek project partners. One of the houses was double glazed, the other used imported Swedish triple glazing, and both had been fitted with mechanical ventilation with heat recovery (MVHR). Neither house had anything in the way of conventional space heating, but both had wood burning stoves and both had solar thermal panels on the roof.<br /><br />And what were they like to live in? Had they been cold during our recent cold snaps? Were the residents togged up with woolly hats and scarves, regretting their decision to be so bold as to do away with space heating?<br /><br />Joan Barker, the builder of the house near Beverley, was still in the process of finishing off the house. She and her husband had moved in about a week before my visit (when it was really cold) and she said that it had been a little chilly for the first two days right after the move, and she admitted to using a couple of 2kW convector heaters to get up to comfort. But since then, no extra heating at all: and the wood burner was only being lit in the evenings. I would have said that she was already one happy bunny, and felt vindicated by her decision to do away with radiators and/or underfloor heating.<br /><br />In Accrington, David and Jane Hartley had been living in their home since the summer and had had longer to figure out how it was responding. They kept their multifuel Dunsley stove going throughout the winter months (using coal only at night to keep it going) and the MVHR system distributed the heat around the house quite effectively. The room temperatures varied between 14°C and 18°C — not warm by current central heating standards but they found it quite comfortable. Although the stove is located in the middle of the large central living area downstairs, they tended to spend much of their evenings in an upstairs lounge and they noticed that the temperatures were more even upstairs than downstairs, where two of the peripheral rooms were noticeably cooler than the main living area where the stove is. This may be an effect of the uneven distribution of heat via the MVHR ducting.<br /><br />So have they done it? Are these no heat homes, or are they merely modern variations of houses that might have been built in Beverley and Accrington 100 years ago, heated by solid fuel fires? Are we simply using modern technology (fans and ducting) to shift heat around a house more effectively? These are all interesting questions which I am not sure I can provide a coherent answer to just yet. But in the absence of any genuine Passive Houses in the UK thus far, these SIPs homes stand out as being as close to the new paradigm as we are likely to get in the next few years (being super insulated, pretty airtight, and mechanically ventilated) and they do look to be providing comfortable living conditions with a minimal energy input, which is after all what this low energy thing is all about. I guess the success or failure of these schemes should ultimately be assessed by the size of their fuel bills and in neither instance had they been in occupation long enough to make a judgement on this.<div class="blogger-post-footer">Visit http://www.ovolobooks.co.uk for more information on our leading self-build books</div>http://www.housebuildersupdate.co.uk/2008/02/are-these-no-heat-homes.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Mark Brinkley)18tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15549266.post-904151294746559807Thu, 03 Jan 2008 09:08:00 +00002008-12-11T14:10:37.912+01:00HIPS update<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_3iqp6erxj3s/R3ylB9ZFVyI/AAAAAAAAANs/VIG7cVyHxAE/s1600-h/kirstie.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_3iqp6erxj3s/R3ylB9ZFVyI/AAAAAAAAANs/VIG7cVyHxAE/s320/kirstie.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5151173526883227426" /></a>Whilst the housing market may be taking a bath, many people (OK… Kirstie Allsports) are tempted to blame the introduction of HIPS which are now required on all new homes in England & Wales. But the price of providing these seems to be falling by the day. There are now apparently 10,000 trained Energy Assessors and they are getting as little as £60 a house for their efforts. Methinks they’d be better off with a window cleaning round. Many estate agents are swallowing the extra costs within their fee structures in any event.<br /><br />Compared with the huge increases in stamp duty on property purchases, brought in by Chancellor Gordon Brown in his first budget in 1997, the cost of HIPs is nothing but a minor irritant.<div class="blogger-post-footer">Visit http://www.ovolobooks.co.uk for more information on our leading self-build books</div>http://www.housebuildersupdate.co.uk/2008/01/hips-update.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Mark Brinkley)21tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15549266.post-4708111110045717954Sat, 15 Dec 2007 11:48:00 +00002007-12-15T12:49:31.792+01:00Sign of the TimesWelcome to the <a href="http://www.propertysnake.co.uk">Property Snake</a>.<div class="blogger-post-footer">Visit http://www.ovolobooks.co.uk for more information on our leading self-build books</div>http://www.housebuildersupdate.co.uk/2007/12/sign-of-times.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Mark Brinkley)5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15549266.post-3591064137835520937Wed, 21 Nov 2007 06:54:00 +00002008-12-11T14:10:37.981+01:00Eco Bollocks Award: Terminal 5<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_3iqp6erxj3s/R0PiL-3oMUI/AAAAAAAAAM8/Fk_ukTB75Ms/s1600-h/Terminal+5.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_3iqp6erxj3s/R0PiL-3oMUI/AAAAAAAAAM8/Fk_ukTB75Ms/s320/Terminal+5.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5135196695615254850" /></a>News has reached me of the fantastic efforts BAA have been making to help preserve the environment at Heathrow’s Terminal 5, due to open in March 2008. It’s taken the sustainable approach to building very seriously.<br /><br />Terminal 5, which is so big that it is actually three terminals, designated 5A, 5B and 5C, will use two separate water systems, one for drinking and the other for toilet flushing and irrigation. Water for the second system will be sourced from an in-house rainwater harvesting system, topped up with a borehole supply. They hope to be able to collect and re-use 85% of the rain falling on the terminal catchment area.<br /><br />In addition, all the bathrooms will have dual flush toilets, and the taps will have on-off sensors combined with aerated flow. BAA trills that it aims to reduce the demand from the public water supply by up to 70%.<br /><br />Come on guys, stop trilling. It’s an airport.<div class="blogger-post-footer">Visit http://www.ovolobooks.co.uk for more information on our leading self-build books</div>http://www.housebuildersupdate.co.uk/2007/11/eco-bollocks-award-terminal-5.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Mark Brinkley)11tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15549266.post-896546215088312276Tue, 20 Nov 2007 16:05:00 +00002007-11-20T17:16:55.257+01:00Is Hydro the only acceptable sorm of generationIt has happened to me again. I was asked to help a client who wanted to install a solar PV system to generate their own electricity. No urgent need for it other than the clients "want to do their bit for the environment". Once I explained the probable costs involved, shockingly they quickly went off the idea. I suggested either wind or water but these did not meet with too much enthusiasm either. Turns out they are active in a protest group trying to stop a wind farm being built on the hill opposite their front door and having their own wind turbine did not sit too well. They have plenty of wind (which is why they are building the wind farm opposite) and it was possible to see the cogs turning - was it possible to do it and avoid being hung by their mates? <br /><br />A bit of further investigation dug out that uncle, who owns the farm next door, has "a bit of a stream. Probably too small". A swift survey showed that the stream has the potential to support a 2kw turbine - enough for 3 houses. The clients, their uncle and the guy next door are now looking to club together to put the turbine in, and have free electricity for the next 20 years. <br /><br />Every time I do a seminar I tell the audience to check their stream, however small it may seem. But they never do. They always think I don't mean them because their stream really is too small. But I do, and it probably isn't.<div class="blogger-post-footer">Visit http://www.ovolobooks.co.uk for more information on our leading self-build books</div>http://www.housebuildersupdate.co.uk/2007/11/is-hydro-only-acceptable-sorm-of.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Tim Pullen)9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15549266.post-7917530119048861477Wed, 14 Nov 2007 13:44:00 +00002007-11-14T17:10:57.490+01:00Are flourescent lamps efficientI have been asked a few times lately if it is better to leave fluorescent lights switched on as they use so much energy to start up? And, are fluorescent tubes (and by extension compact fluorescent lamps – low energy lamps)really efficient?<br /><br />Fluorescent lamps, be they standard strip lights or compact fluorescents, use gas discharge technology and it takes 3 to 15 minutes (depending on the type of lamp) to vapourise the gas, get up to temperature and reach full luminosity. It takes no extra power to do this, just a bit of time. So the argument for leaving lights on relates to time rather than energy. If you are popping in and out of a room all day you probably want to leave it on. Otherwise turn it off. To put it simply a light left on uses more energy than a light turned off. <br /><br />Fluorescents are more efficient than incandescent lamps by a factor of about 4. To be technical, they produce around 90 lumens per watt compared to about 20 watts for incandescents (these figures vary with the type of lamp but are broadly accurate). It is why incandescents have been banned in Australia and are being phased out here. They give a different quality of light, which is what leads to the idea that they are not as bright and therefore you need more of them. My Grandma said the same when her gas lamps were replaced with nasty electric bulbs, but she got over it. <br /><br />While we are on the subject, I have also been asked if fluorescents have nasty chemicals and gases in them, and the answer is yes! They have 5mg of mercury in a 40w tube. It is a tiny amount, less than the size of a pin head – but poisonous nonetheless. They also have a phosphor coating to the glass (which is what fluoresces and produces the light) which is not pleasant, but not poisonous. The gas in the tube is usually argon which is inert and harmless. <br /><br />There are new lamps about to hit the market that use xenon gas – no mercury and no phosphors – which are even more efficient. These will produce over 120 lumens per watt.<div class="blogger-post-footer">Visit http://www.ovolobooks.co.uk for more information on our leading self-build books</div>http://www.housebuildersupdate.co.uk/2007/11/are-flourescent-lamps-efficient.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Tim Pullen)5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15549266.post-6110432607412728604Mon, 12 Nov 2007 19:10:00 +00002007-11-12T20:11:03.267+01:00Pumping heatSpent the weekend dispensing bon-mots and advice in Harrogate at the <a href="http://www.homebuildingshow.co.uk">Homebuilding & Renovating show</a>, one of six held throughout the UK each year. This year I have been delivering a short lecture on sustainable homebuilding and it has sparked some interesting questions and comments from the audience. However this Sunday it all got a little fiery when someone asked about the difference between air source and ground source heat pumps and whether either made sense for his building project. Rather like the output from these heat pumps, my response was just a little lukewarm. <br /><br />What I specifically said was that heat pumps don’t make much sense if mains gas is available but that there should be a reasonable payback against oil. “You are doing well if you get a Coefficient of Performance of more than 3.0,” I said. I have been consistently saying this for some time now and at least one heat pump manufacturer, <a href="http://www.kensaengineering.com"> Kensa</a>, seem happy to agree with me.<br /><br />But up stands this man in the audience who said that heat pumps could now deliver over 6.0 — i.e. twice as much heat output for the power input. Before I could stop myself, I blurted out “That’s rubbish.” It obviously hit a nerve, because he stood up and started getting shirty with me. “What do I know about it” sort of stuff. I have no idea who he was but can only guess he was working for one of the many heat pump suppliers exhibiting at the show.<br /><br />This made me go all defensive and I started quoting a couple of studies back at him that showed that heat pumps often don’t deliver what manufacturers claim. If only to prove that I do know something about it, if not exactly ranking at world expert status. This of course made matters worse and our man turns around and walks out of the seminar theatre in an act of brazen defiance. <br /><br />You could have heard a pin drop. Normally, these events pass by without any rancour at all and everything is sweetness and light from start to finish. Here there was a definite feeling that someone thought I that I was being out of order and should be upbraided.<br /><br />What I think this shows is that the heat pump market is maturing fast, perhaps a little too fast. By all means consider the merits of using a heat pump, but don’t get sucked in by <a href="http://markbrinkley.blogspot.com/2006/01/just-how-good-are-heat-pumps.html">the hype</a>, and beware claims of extraordinary efficiencies achieved.<div class="blogger-post-footer">Visit http://www.ovolobooks.co.uk for more information on our leading self-build books</div>http://www.housebuildersupdate.co.uk/2007/11/pumping-heat.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Mark Brinkley)11tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15549266.post-2057304263384211434Thu, 01 Nov 2007 16:07:00 +00002007-11-01T17:27:41.216+01:00How sustainable are the sustainable suppliers?It occurred to me the other day that my local builder’s merchant is selling a range of sustainable and eco-friendlier materials in an entirely unsustainable and non-eco friendly shed. At first this seems a bit of an anomaly. If he is going to pretend to be eco-friendly then he should at least make some effort to make the shed LOOK eco-friendly. If we are to be completely right-on then everything up to and including the gas that was used to cook the breakfast for the driver of the lorry that delivers our sheep wool insulation should be from a sustainable source. If not it just adds to the carbon footprint and negates the whole point of trying to build sustainably. <br /><br />But life ain’t like that. The builder’s merchant operates from a building that was erected some years ago and he is not going to change that. Should I bleat about the building not being sustainable or be grateful that the scales have fallen and he is seeing that there is a market for sustainable materials? <br /><br />Take my own case. As a sustainability consultant it might be expected that everything about me is ecologically sound. The truth is that I run a oil-fired boiler to heat my house. It is fast approaching the end of its useful life and that will be the time to switch to something more sustainable – possibly wood pellet or a log-burning stove with back boiler I have just found at less than £1,500. <br /><br />Changing before now would mean throwing away a perfectly good machine with life still in it and adding to the carbon overhead with a new piece of kit. <br /><br />Similarly, I drive a beat-up old car. Some say it is because I am too mean to buy a new one. I say it is because the carbon overhead of a new car is too big to think about and an old car has no embodied CO2 left in it.<br /><br />So maybe the answer is - all we can do is what we can do. There is a clear and growing movement to building sustainably. It may still be slow movement, but if we do what we can it will get quicker.<div class="blogger-post-footer">Visit http://www.ovolobooks.co.uk for more information on our leading self-build books</div>http://www.housebuildersupdate.co.uk/2007/11/how-sustainable-are-sustainable.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Tim Pullen)11tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15549266.post-1047041720483774065Wed, 31 Oct 2007 06:58:00 +00002007-10-31T08:01:48.058+01:00On Carbon OffsettingA couple of weeks ago I went to a gathering organised by <a href="http://www.cambridgeenergy.com">Cambridge Energy</a>. The subject of debate was <i>Carbon Offsetting: fix or fig-leaf?</i> And very interesting it all proved to be. <br /><br />I am of the camp that thinks it's pretty much fig-leaf. The first person I bumped into there was Andy Brown, an old acquaintance of mine who now works at <a href="http://www.carltd.com">Cambridge Architectural Research</a>. Andy is even more of a fig-leafer than I am. He runs something called <a href="http://www.cambridgecarbonfootprint.org">Cambridge Carbon Footprint</a> in his spare time; I am not completely clear what it does but one thing it doesn’t do is sell carbon offsets.<br /><br />The speakers at the event were a mixed bunch. Fiona Harvey of the Financial Times gave a run down of some of the carbon offset scams she had uncovered recently. These included a company selling offsets which consisted of sequestering CO2 by pumping it down into oil wells, when the real purpose of this operation was to increase the gas pressure in the wells and thereby help to extract the last of the oil down there. <br /><br />Then Michael Schlup told us about the Gold Standard, a sort of UN backed quality assurance scheme for carbon offsets. I wasn’t convinced but he made the interesting point that you can’t realistically offset within Europe because the total amount of CO2 released is already capped (at least in theory, by Kyoto): it therefore only works in territories where there is no capping. Hence so many carbon offsetting schemes being Third World projects.<br /><br />Now many people are cynical about <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/08/19/ncarbon119.xml">rock stars offsetting their world tours by planting mango forests in India</a>, but are happy to accept the principle of offsetting home produced renewable energy in order to obtain zero carbon status for a housing project. But logically, it’s all offsetting. As is buying electricity from a green supplier. Unless you aim to live entirely off grid and entirely without recourse to fossil fuels, which most people think is virtually impossible in the Western world today, then you can only approach being carbon neutral by trading your excess renewable power or biomass sequestration project, or by getting someone else to do this for you. <br /><br />So despite all the scams and the indulgences it attracts, the principle of offsetting is sound. But it still sticks in the craw: the idea that I can burn more carbon if you do something to absorb that carbon. There is, whether you like it or not, something rather unpleasant going on here. It has been expertly satirised by Andy Brown’s son, Alex Randall, who runs the <a href="http://www.cheatneutral.com">Cheat Neutral</a> website.<br /><br />This debate is particularly relevant to the Code for Sustainable Homes because it seems happy to accept some forms of offsetting but not others. This is difficult territory. <br /><br />• The CSH accepts that it’s not possible to have a house generate all its electricity all the time, so it is permissible to trade any surplus you generate on sunny or windy days with the National Grid. Like it or not, that’s an offset.<br /><br />• But the CSH also recognises that is impractical for every Code Level 6 house to be expected to generate renewable power, so the offset is extended to include community power schemes, such as CHP and district heating. So we have moved a level further out: they now accept offsite offsetting.<br /><br />• How far off site can this renewable power plant be situated? It seems churlish to impose a maximum distance, so they have to accept that it could be many miles away. But how far? How about out in the North Sea?<br /><br />By now, you can see that we are straying into very difficult territory. The CSH zero carbon definition is adamant that it won’t allow schemes simply to sign up for a renewable electricity tariff, because anyone can do that anytime. Somehow they want to be able to ensure that the renewable power generated for the scheme is unique and is additional to any other source, but this is much easier said than done. How do you enforce an individual home owner, let alone an entire housing scheme, to finance, say, an off shore windfarm? Especially in a country where we are all free to switch power suppliers at the click of a mouse. The government’s definition of zero carbon hinges on this conundrum and I don’t think anyone is going to be able to come up with a compelling definition, because the rules they dream up will look arbitrary and nonsensical. <br /><br />The problem is of course that once you accept one bit of the offsetting model as being legitimate, then logically it’s all legitimate. After all carbon molecules don’t much care what happens to them and as far as CO2 reduction is concerned, a carbon molecule sequestered in an Indian mango forest is just as good as one saved from being burned in a power station because you have PV on your roof. <br /><br />I don’t have a lot of sympathy for the government here. After all, it was they who dreamed up this silly target of the zero carbon home, something that is impossible to exist without embracing the concept of carbon offsetting. They now want to pick and choose which offsetting bits they like and which they don’t. I will rather enjoy watching them wriggle on their own hook. <br /><br />Damned difficult, this carbon offsetting.<div class="blogger-post-footer">Visit http://www.ovolobooks.co.uk for more information on our leading self-build books</div>http://www.housebuildersupdate.co.uk/2007/10/on-carbon-offsetting.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Mark Brinkley)3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15549266.post-5999329294027463796Fri, 26 Oct 2007 07:06:00 +00002007-10-26T08:07:19.605+01:00Michelle KaufmannCheck out this <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0aCn9bDgYiM">video link</a> if you want to know more about California’s answer to Bill Dunster.<div class="blogger-post-footer">Visit http://www.ovolobooks.co.uk for more information on our leading self-build books</div>http://www.housebuildersupdate.co.uk/2007/10/michelle-kaufmann.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Mark Brinkley)2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15549266.post-8572854630365516318Sun, 21 Oct 2007 07:28:00 +00002007-10-21T08:32:25.021+01:00Energy saving adviceDear Mr Brinkley. Thankyou for filling out our home energy check questionnaire: an important step towards using less energy to heat, light and power your home. Using the information you’ve provided, we’ve come up with a practical look at the energy you use and can save at home.<br /><br />About a month previously I had responded to a questionnaire that had arrived, unsolicited, by mail from the Energy Savings Trust. It asked me lots of questions about my house and suggested that if I send it back to them they will supply me with a mini energy audit. Only I don’t think they called it that. <br /><br />I was interested to know what they would say because our house is arguably an interesting case. Built in 1992, it was certainly someway in advance of building regulations at the time. In particular, it incorporated underfloor insulation (not mandatory until 2002) and low-e double glazing (back when low-e was cutting edge). The walls had a little extra insulation and the oil-fired boiler heating system was reasonably well designed and included zone control, as well as thermostatic and time switching. It’s a well-built house and it probably rated as a Best Practice for 1992 sort of house, but certainly not an eco house.<br /><br />The question that I was interested to see answered was what the EST would suggest that I did to upgrade the house. In fact, they have only made one suggestion. That is that we upgrade the boiler to a condensing boiler for a saving of £85 a year. Or, in terms of CO2, 0.6 tonnes.<br /><br />Funnily enough, we did consider installing a condensing boiler when we built the house. Back then, there was only one oil-fired condenser on the market, made by Geminox, a French manufacturer. Our green-tinged plumber, Norman Cox, was keen for us to fit one, but in the end I took the decision that it wasn’t worth paying the extra £1,000 or so required to fit — cash was tight back in 1992 and I had heard one or two stories about the early Geminoxes which didn’t inspire confidence. <br /><br />We ended up with a Boulter Camray (now part of the Worcester Bosch group) which has been chugging away these past 15 years. It gets an annual service (cost around £60 plus parts) and it occasionally breaks down. The last time this happened, I enquired from Shelford Heating about replacing the boiler with a condenser but was told that not only would we have to bear the cost of a new boiler, but that the oil tank would have to move because the position we placed it in in 1992 (right next to the house wall) is now regarded as a fire hazard (Part J of the building regs having been “upgraded”). Not only would that double the expense but there is no obvious place in the steeply sloping garden to place a new oil tank. It would in fact represent a major piece of civil engineering. So a replacement boiler would probably end up costing us around £8,000. Hmm. Should have fitted the Geminox 15 years ago, shouldn’t I. <br /><br />Anyway, I am slowly but surely getting around to the point of this post. The Energy Saving Trust gave us a C rating, based on what I told them. This is sort of similar to the rating we would be getting from an energy performance certificate. I have no quibbles with that: it was what I expected. But the point is that they only made the one suggestion for improvement, which was to replace the old boiler with something more efficient. The saving was actually pretty minimal. Either with or without a condensing boiler, our not very old house still uses a fuck of a lot of oil. Around 2500lts each year (that’s just over a tank full). That converts to just over 25,000kWh, which converts to 7 tonnes CO2 per annum. The Energy Savings Trust estimation is pretty accurate on the size of our oil bill (just about £1,000 with oil at 36p/lt) but grossly underestimates our CO2 footprint: they suggest just 4.1 tonnes of CO2 per annum. I reckon it is over 7 tonnes. Why should that be? Do they use different conversion factors to me? I’m on 0.265kg CO2/kWh, which is the “industry standard.”<br /><br />So my poser for the day is what should happen to houses like ours? If it was built to Passivhaus standards, or Code Level 4, and was still heated using an oil-fired boiler, it would be burning about a third or even a quarter of this quantity of oil, releasing maybe just 1.5 tonnes of CO2 a year to get space heating and hot water. So, although our house is probably more energy efficient than 90% of the UK housing stock, it still performs miserably in terms of what could be done. But there appears to be no upgrade path apart from fitting a condensing boiler, which really only makes a marginal difference.<br /><br />I don’t have an answer to this, but it does highlight the enormity of the problem. What exactly do you do to a house that already has cavities full of insulation and has 200mm of the stuff in the loft, but still eats energy like it’s going out of fashion?<div class="blogger-post-footer">Visit http://www.ovolobooks.co.uk for more information on our leading self-build books</div>http://www.housebuildersupdate.co.uk/2007/10/energy-saving-advice.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Ovolo Books)4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15549266.post-4080077962260411627Mon, 15 Oct 2007 09:38:00 +00002008-12-11T14:10:38.483+01:00My hot tip for property investors<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_3iqp6erxj3s/RxM0VENwVTI/AAAAAAAAAMM/VsAMCzFgtqI/s1600-h/Housing+Mix+for+GB.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_3iqp6erxj3s/RxM0VENwVTI/AAAAAAAAAMM/VsAMCzFgtqI/s320/Housing+Mix+for+GB.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5121494737763718450" /></a>Here’s an interesting little graph, which I gleaned from the Oct 07 edition of Housebuilder magazine. It shows the extraordinary transformation in the supply of new homes in Britain over the past decade. In 1998, nearly half of all new homes were detached. Today, the figure is just 20%. In contrast, flats have gone from around 18% of the total to just under 50%. Effectively, the positions of detached houses and flats have swapped over, whilst terraced houses and semis have stayed much as they were, at least in terms of proportions of overall mix.<br /><br />Now there are well-known reasons for this turnaround. 1998 marked the start of the brownfield land building campaign and the move towards densification. Or put another way, it marked the beginning of the end of developers being able to buy green fields and plonk estates of detached houses on them at very low densities.<br /><br />Nevertheless, I am still struck by this graph. The turnaround really is quite dramatic. And it does make you wonder whether this emphasis on building flats is sustainable (in the economic sense). It would seem that, all other things being equal (i.e. pre 1998), housebuilders would be knocking out masses more detached houses than they are, but the constraints of the planning policies have more or less put a stop to this. Presumably the underlying demand for detached homes is as large as ever: given the choice, most people would probably rather bring up a family in a detached house with a garden rather than a flat. And most young flat dwellers would probably envisage themselves moving into a detached house if and when they start families. That looks as though it’s going to become an increasingly difficult aspiration to meet. So if this new housing mix remains in place — or even becomes more pronounced over the coming years — then expect to see the relative value of detached houses increase, and flats to decrease. <br /><br />How’s that for a bit of financial forecasting? Revisit this blog in 2017 and see if my prediction works out.<div class="blogger-post-footer">Visit http://www.ovolobooks.co.uk for more information on our leading self-build books</div>http://www.housebuildersupdate.co.uk/2007/10/my-hot-tip-for-property-investors.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Mark Brinkley)9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15549266.post-611777451186984020Wed, 10 Oct 2007 10:59:00 +00002007-10-11T10:22:34.175+01:00Can a bathroom makeover be eco-friendly?I was recently asked to write an article on “How to Give Your Bathroom an Eco-Makeover”. My first reaction was to blanche. How can anything as superficial as a “makeover” be eco-friendly? The eco-cause, green building, sustainability, these are important issues that cannot be taken so lightly as to be associated with a quick lick of organic paint and some recycled batik cushions.<br /><br />But then I paused and thought a moment. I have for a long time believed in the maxim that change is a process, not an event. I also believe that we have to change the way we build houses and live in them. If for no other reason than that there is no good reason to go on the way we are. Maybe its is a generation thing (maybe I am just mean), but I abhor waste and the way we build houses is massively wasteful. They waste materials, many of which are from finite resources, they waste energy, again mostly from a finite resource, and most importantly they waste money. And they produce waste, and lots of it.<br /><br />The Government is forcing the change with the Ecohomes standard, The Code for Sustainable Homes and significant stiffening of the Building Regulations. Mark Brinkley has written at length in this blog about the anomalies in these new codes and how they are more or less ineffective. Most of which I agree with. But he makes my point for me. These new standards are making the necessary change an event – zero carbon by 2016 – without winning the hearts and minds necessary to make it happen. They certainly haven’t won Mark Brinkley’s heart or mind, and as I travel around speaking on sustainability I find he is not alone.<br /><br />I am about to make a presentation to a group of building control officers on the Ecohomes standard. The reason? Their boss had caught another of my presentations and had not realised what the standard entailed or how building control officers would be involved. Again, the change has been dumped on them without any attempt to justify its aims or to win them over to the cause – or, it seems, even to provide them with basic training as to what the standards contain. What will happen is that the building control officers, upon whom the self-builder or developer will depend, will be poorly informed and resentful. As a consequence they will, at best, be unhelpful and maybe even obstructive.<br /><br />I have experience of other quality management systems and what happens is that people do as little as possible to comply and spend all their time, and money, finding ways around each particular requirement. That already happens with Building Regs and always has. It is a fence we have to jump over and obviously we clear it by as little as possible. Very rarely, almost never, do you find any attempt to voluntarily exceed the standard. The same is set to apply to the Code and Ecohomes, although the opportunity still exists to “sell” the idea as something more than a minimum standard that we are dragged, kicking and screaming, to. We could be encouraged to take it on with enthusiasm; as a means of building better homes, less wasteful homes, homes that will last 100 years.<br /><br />To take an example, I have a client who is converting a cob barn to what will be a lovely home. The problem he has is that building control has no knowledge of the thermal performance of a cob wall (for the uninitiated, cob is a mixture of clay and straw formed into walls 500mm to 700mm thick and rendered with lime. It is a building method some 400 years old that is still fairly common in the South West of England). Cob is know to provide a relatively constant internal temperature and consequently needs little energy to heat – the cob providing good thermal mass. What my client has to do is pay Plymouth University to test the cob walls and arrive at a U-value to convince building control that this 200 year old building is good to go. Not only that, but everyone, wanting to use cob has to do the same thing. You would think that building control would learn that cob over 500mm thick complies, but no. BRE has not tested it so it does not appear in the tables, and therefore has to be tested afresh every time.<br /><br />The Code is about building sustainable homes and here is a family trying to do exactly that and being stymied at every turn.<br /><br />There are anomalies in the standards, bits that are unworkable and requirements that appear to make no sense. But there is also a lot that is good in them. Measuring the amount of energy and water we use has to be a good start. Raising the standard of noise insulation and encouraging the use of brownfield sites also have to be good ideas, as does encouraging the use of materials from sustainable sources. But of course this great Government of ours is deaf to the pleas that the anomalies need to be addressed. Thereby condemning the Code to be no more than another pile of bureaucratic paperwork that has to be complied with.<br /><br />If, like me, you believe that changing the way we build and power our houses is a good idea – because it is a good idea to leave something for our children’s children to build with – then embrace the Code. Work round the anomalies, step over the unworkable bits and move on. In essence it provides the basis for a new way of thinking about how to build, and in time, maybe, it will evolve into a useful document.<br /><br />Have thought all these thoughts, I returned to the article with a fresh view. Change is a process and it has to start somewhere. A small change that is successful is more likely to lead to more change than a big change that fails. So giving your bathroom an eco-makeover is actually a great idea. It enables the homeowner to address all the key issues – energy, water and materials – in microcosm. The project is likely to be successful as it is doable, affordable and the changes wrought will be effective. It is to be hoped that the success will lead to further projects, more success and a realisation that the eco-cause is not exclusively for people with beards and open-toed sandals.<div class="blogger-post-footer">Visit http://www.ovolobooks.co.uk for more information on our leading self-build books</div>http://www.housebuildersupdate.co.uk/2007/10/can-makeover-be-eco.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Tim Pullen)2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15549266.post-6194536238816823211Thu, 04 Oct 2007 12:24:00 +00002007-10-04T13:24:43.585+01:00Housing PolicyLow Energy HomesDrilling Down into the Code: Part 3The <a href="http://www.planningportal.gov.uk/england/professionals/en/1115314116927.html ">Code for Sustainable Homes</a> is a hotch potch. Whilst zero carbon and, to a much lesser extent, water use reduction have been discussed at length, if you were to build the most energy and water efficient house possible, you’d still only score 44% of the maximum available eco points. That would get you to Code Level 1. Code Level 6, the top level, requires a score of 90%.<br /><br />So how would you go about garnering the other percentage points required to lever your house up from Code Level 1 to Level 6? <br /><br />The answer is that you have to accumulate credits (of varying value) by undertaking all manner of other actions. Some are relatively easy:<br />• Provision for cycle storage — score 2.5%<br />• Provision of a home office — score 1.25%<br />• Provision of recycling bins and a compost bin — 4.75%<br />• Use EU approved insulation — 0.6%<br /><br />Others are more taxing and potentially a lot more costly<br />• Build to Lifetime Homes standards — 4.75%<br />• Build to Secured by Design standards — 2.25%<br />• Improve on Part E sound regulations — 4.75%<br />• Use A+ rated materials from the Green Guide for Specification — 4.5%<br />• Build into the basement or the loftspace — 2.65%<br /><br />You can only afford to lose 10% of the credits available if you want to qualify for Code Level 6. As there are likely to be some areas where your site cannot score at all, the likelihood is that designers will be forced to incorporate practically every feature mentioned in the Code. The elbow room for trade-off is remarkably limited. <br /><br />This is where the Code gets into sticky ground. A lot of these features — there are 34 tests applied in all — are concerned with good design and best practice, but not necessarily to do with sustainability. For instance, having your builder signed up for the Considerate Contractors Scheme (worth 2.25%) is all very well but doesn’t really make much difference to climate change. So why is it being included in the Code?<br /><br />And the requirement for A or A+ rated materials is effectively going to blacklist an awful lot of C rated materials. I am not sure the PVCu manufacturers have yet twigged this, but the Code has it in for them.<div class="blogger-post-footer">Visit http://www.ovolobooks.co.uk for more information on our leading self-build books</div>http://www.housebuildersupdate.co.uk/2007/10/drilling-down-into-code-part-3.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Mark Brinkley)10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15549266.post-6582938219410027446Mon, 01 Oct 2007 18:52:00 +00002007-10-01T19:52:58.186+01:00How should we manage water use in the home?The more I learn about the <a href="http://www.planningportal.gov.uk/england/professionals/en/1115314116927.html">Code for Sustainable Homes</a>, the more uncomfortable I get. I mentioned that I had been in on an interesting seminar last week, on the water use guidelines set out in the Code, and this week I investigated a little further, armed with an Excel spreadsheet. <br /><br />Water use is one of two mandatory aspects of the Code (the other being energy use). Mandatory, in this instance, means that you have to meet certain targets as regards notional water use in order for the house to gain a particular Code Level. It’s no good building a zero carbon house if it fails to meet the water use standards as well. <br /><br />The target water usage levels that the Code demands go like this:<br />• Levels 1 and 2: theoretical 120 litres/person/day <br />• Levels 3 and 4: theoretical 105 litres/person/day <br />• Levels 5 and 6: theoretical 80 litres/person/day <br /><br />Now I guess many people have read the code and noticed these figures and probably thought very little more about them. I certainly hadn’t until I sat in on this seminar last week. Until then, they were just numbers jumping at me off the page: they didn’t relate to anything or any actions. But my eyes have been opened and what I am now seeing is a little disturbing.<br /><br />The point is that it doesn’t matter how much water you actually use, the Code judges everything by Mr and Mrs Average, Joe and Joanna public, and according to water company statistics, they use about 130lts per day each. They break it down thus:<br /><br />• They each flush the loo 4.8 times a day (c 20lts)<br />• They wash their hands or brush their teeth for 40 seconds a day (10lts)<br />• They use about 25 lts at the kitchen sink each day<br />• Their washing machines account for 16lts per day each (49 lts per cycle, and J&J each use it once every three days)<br />• Their dishwasher uses another 4lts per day each<br />• And then there’s showering and bathing. It gets complex here because Jo likes showers and Joanna likes baths, but overall it evens out and tends to account for 50lts per day each <br />• I make that 125lts a day each. Give or take 5 lts, that’s it.<br />• This might have been better with a pie chart, but it wouldn’t have been so much fun.<br /><br />The standards set out in the Code would seem to indicate implicitly that this amount of water usage (i.e. 130lts per person per day) is unsustainable — i.e. wicked and to be strongly discouraged. The challenge set out in the Code is not to change the washing or bathing habits of Joe and Joanna, but rather to engineer in solutions which enable them to live exactly as they do now whilst consuming much less piped water. <br /><br />Welcome to the world of water-efficient appliances. Low flush toilets help matters, and that without any apparent pain. If you can specify aerated taps on the kitchen sink and a water-efficient washing machine you can rapidly reduce that notional figure of 130 lts per person per day down to just over 100 lts per day. So far so good. Just as with energy efficiency measures, the first steps are easy and cost effective. So you can get to Code Level 4 without too much hassle.<br /><br />It’s that 80 litres a day at Level 5 and 6 which is the problem. You see there just don’t exist any water efficient products that can get Joe and Joanna’s usage down to such a low notional figure. That’s where my spreadsheet came in: I was tinkering with all the very low water usage appliances out there and I still couldn’t get below 102 lts per person per day. This includes:<br /><br />• dual flush toilets that work on 4.5 lts full and 3 lts half flush<br />• showers that use just 7 lts per minute<br />• aerated kitchen taps using 2.5 lts per minute<br />• washing machines using 35 lts per cycle rather than 49 lts<br /><br />So how do you go that extra mile, or in this case 22 lts, and get the notional consumption down to Code Level 5 and 6 requirements? The answer the Code is steering us towards is, of course, recycling, either via rainwater harvesting or grey water systems. But even by taking this big leap, you are not guaranteed a result. This is because Joe and Joanna, even with the most water efficient appliances installed in their home, are still using more than 80 lts a day before so much as a loo is flushed. Grey water systems, which reuse bath, shower and basin water for toilet flushing purposes, aren’t going to get you under the 80lts per person per day figure on their own. Rainwater harvesting systems can be set up to run washing machines as well as flush toilets and so in theory could get your notional usage figure down below 80lts per person per day, but only if they operate at near 100% efficiency which is unlikely over the course of a year — in prolonged periods without rain, the storage tanks empty and the systems switch over to tap water. <br /><br />The conclusion has to be that this 80lts per person per day figure is really at the limits of what is technically possible at the moment. It may well be that you have to fit both a grey water and a rainwater recycling system to meet the target. Grey water systems seem to cost anywhere between £1500 and £2000, rainwater rather more. That’s not a problem if you are building exemplar homes for demonstration purposes but remember we are aiming this at every new home built after 2016. That is a phenomenal challenge and a phenomenal expense to be borne.<br /><br />There are some further strange anomalies in how the guidance has been put together. If you specify a bidet, you take an instant 5lt per person per day penalty; if you specify a water softener, you take a 12.5lt per person per day penalty. It’s hard to see how anyone will be able to fit these into a new home and still make Code Level 6. On the other hand, if you specify a swimming pool or an outdoor whirlpool bath, there is no penalty at all! <br /><br />Rather than tinkering about with how we distribute water around the home, wouldn’t it be a lot easier and a lot less hassle just to charge the correct price for tap water in the first place? All new homes in England have metered supplies now in any event, so we already have a perfectly responsive mechanism in place for restricting water usage. As has been pointed out elsewhere, there are many parts of the country where water shortage is not and is never likely to be an issue. Shouldn’t the water restriction measures in the Code reflect this?<br /><br />Underlying this is a debate very similar to the one raging over renewable energy. The government seems to be keen to promote onsite renewable energy (also via the Code) despite all the evidence being that it is much cheaper and more efficient to green the National Grid. With water, there is no national water grid but coincidentally, there is an <a href="http://www.building.co.uk/story.asp?storycode=3096068&origin=bldgnewsletter">article in this week’s Building by David Lush</a> arguing that there should be. The main argument used against building a national water distribution system is cost and Lush quotes an Environment Agency consultation paper suggesting that it would cost between £9billion and £15billion. That may sound like a lot, but £2,500 spent on water reduction measures in every house after 2016 would cost £625million a year and would end up surpassing the cost of building a national water grid after 20 years. Neither option is exactly cheap. It may be that we should do both: I am not against recycling grey water or rainwater, but I do worry about the Code’s insistence that we must keep putting more and more stuff into our homes in order to make them sustainable. Stuff not only costs, but it breaks down, it needs servicing. Its all very well enthusiasts fitting stuff, but 250,000 homes a year? Has anyone seriously thought through the implications?<div class="blogger-post-footer">Visit http://www.ovolobooks.co.uk for more information on our leading self-build books</div>http://www.housebuildersupdate.co.uk/2007/10/how-should-we-manage-water-use-in-home.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Mark Brinkley)5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15549266.post-7611783899040448319Thu, 20 Sep 2007 12:04:00 +00002007-09-20T13:04:47.639+01:00Code for Sustainable Homes: cracks appearingJust got back from a two-day symposium run by Nottingham University’s School of the Built Environment. There were a number of very interesting and cogent presentations given mostly by academics, architects and materials suppliers, and unusually for an event such as this, an overall theme emerged which could perhaps be best summarised as <a href="http://www.planningportal.gov.uk/england/professionals/en/1115314116927.html "><i>Code for Sustainable Homes</a> — Whoaaahh, steady on, not quite so fast</i>.<br /><br />Many experienced voices expressed disquiet about the turn of events over the past twelve months, ever since the government published the Code and announced that it intended to move all new housebuilding to zero carbon by 2016. In particular the Code’s almost wholesale adoption of the PassivHaus standard came in for questioning: its apparent insistence on mechanical ventilation with heat recovery came in for a lot of flack, as was its insistence on heavy and expensive triple glazing and almost excessive zeal in which it promoted airtight construction. There was a feeling that this represented a degree of over-engineering for houses in a relatively mild (and getting milder) climate, where many people still routinely sleep with their windows open. The event saw the launch of a set of different proposals for low energy housing in Mediterranean climates, but the question of whether these were more applicable to the UK than the German PassivHaus standard was left for another day.<br /><br />There was also a healthy debate about how best to power these post-2016 homes. The Code explicitly calls for the homes to generate renewable energy to cover their own energy requirements, but it remains unclear just where or how it can be produced. The preferred solution would seem to be onsite, but everyone agrees that many homes will be completely unsuitable for onsite production. But once you accept that the energy harvesting can move offsite, you run into all manner of problems of definition. District heating systems? Shares in windfarms? Or just buying power from a green energy supplier? All are possible, but they are either technically challenging (CHP) or are just another version of carbon offsetting (widely derided). <br /><br />There was also a good deal of discussion about the water saving proposals contained in the code. The idea is that we should aim to be reducing our water use from around 150lts/day each down to just 80 lts/day at Code Level 6, the 2016 standard. That is surprisingly challenging: even if you fit every water saving device, ultra low flush toilet and lo-flow shower, you still struggle to get below a notional 100lts/day. To get right down below 80lts/day requires on site water harvesting or recycling which again was felt to be fine in principle but the thought of rolling this out into 250,000 new homes a year appears to be fanciful at best. But this is what the code demands after 2016.<div class="blogger-post-footer">Visit http://www.ovolobooks.co.uk for more information on our leading self-build books</div>http://www.housebuildersupdate.co.uk/2007/09/code-for-sustainable-homes-cracks.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Mark Brinkley)8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15549266.post-7661487409055373228Wed, 19 Sep 2007 20:56:00 +00002007-09-19T22:13:34.389+01:00This is what an Energy performance certificate looks like<a href="http://www.housebuildersupdate.co.uk/EPC1.pdf">Click here</a><div class="blogger-post-footer">Visit http://www.ovolobooks.co.uk for more information on our leading self-build books</div>http://www.housebuildersupdate.co.uk/2007/09/this-is-what-energy-performance.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Ovolo Books)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15549266.post-2423776167566570506Wed, 19 Sep 2007 20:51:00 +00002007-09-19T21:54:32.530+01:00ColindaleLondon Fire BrigadeTimber frame firesTimber frame fire findingsThe London Fire Brigade have come back to me with the summary report of their findings on the Colindale fire on Wednesday 12 July 2006. Highlights include:<br /><br />• The building was under construction and consisted of a concrete ground and first floor, with the remaining five upper floors solely constructed from timber.<br /><br />• A fire was first seen at first floor level in Block B4. This is thought to be the fire’s ‘Area of Origin’. Block B4 was part of an ‘L’ shaped building with maximum dimensions 38 metres by 60 metres. The fire’s ‘Area of Origin’ was close to the centre of the building adjacent to the staircase shaft and lift shaft.<br /><br />• The fire spread rapidly through Block B4 with full involvement and collapse of this building in less than 10 minutes.<br /><br />• The fire spread by radiated heat to an adjacent building also under construction. The fire also spread via radiated heat to the top floor and roof of the neighbouring Middlesex University Halls of Residence. There was also damage by radiated heat to thirty vehicles parked in Aerodrome Road and to the “P.N.C. Building” located in the Hendon Police College on the opposite side of Aerodrome Road.<br /><br />• As a result of the fire approximately 180 construction workers were evacuated from Block B1 and Block B2 and approximately 100 students were evacuated from the Middlesex University Halls of Residence. In addition, an unknown number of staff were evacuated from the Hendon Police College complex. No injuries were sustained during the evacuation.<br /><br />And as to cause? The report makes these comments:<br /><br />• The most probable source of ignition of this fire was a carelessly discarded lit cigarette at first floor level in Block B4.<br /><br />• The rapid fire spread was not due to an accelerant and was consistent with the fuel present, i.e. High surface area compared to mass of construction timber, eighteen metres high with virtually unrestricted airflow.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Further thoughts and speculation</span><br /><br />The key word here is <span style="font-style: italic;">accelerant</span>. If there was an accelerant used (i.e. petrol or even paper), then we have a case of malicious arson. The report is quite clear that no accelerant was used. But my first thought was: How the hell can you tell anything about the cause of a fire, if the building has been burned to a crisp in just ten minutes? And why the speculation about a discarded cigarette? Presumably no one has come forward and said “Oh yes, I dropped a fag in B4 just before the fire took hold.” We would have heard. And unless there was a lot of readily combustible material lying around, like plastic sheeting or waste paper, a cigarette would not cause a timber frame building to catch fire. Whilst the fire spread may be consistent with the fuel present (i.e. timber and foam-based insulation), the initial ignition of the fire is more problematic. There surely had to be some intermediary element that could transfer fire from a lighted cigarette to a timber wall. That doesn’t necessarily mean it was a deliberately placed accelerant, of course, but there must have been something easily ignitable present and what that might have been isn’t mentioned.<br /><br />Finally, it appears that there were builders on site but they were evacuated from buildings BI and B2, not B4 where the fire broke out. This suggests that B4 was quiet. That’s handy. And if you wanted to set fire to a block of flats under construction, where would you go about starting it? <span style="font-style: italic;">The fire's area of origin was on the first floor close to the centre of the building adjacent to the staircase shaft and the liftshaft.</span> At the bottom of a staircase and liftwell? Just the spot to turn a small fire into a conflagration in seconds.<br /><br />It’s enough to make you wonder, if nothing else.<div class="blogger-post-footer">Visit http://www.ovolobooks.co.uk for more information on our leading self-build books</div>http://www.housebuildersupdate.co.uk/2007/09/timber-frame-fire-findings.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Ovolo Books)3